Reporters in Maine Made Mum on Climate Change

Climate change deniers are irksome enough on their own, but give them the power to control access to accurate scientific information, and they become downright scary. Witness Michael Palmer, general manager of ABC and Fox television affiliates in Bangor Maine, who according to this article in yesterday’s New York Times, put the kibosh on global warming coverage at his stations until “Bar Harbor is underwater:”

Mr. Palmer said he wanted no more stories broadcast on global warming because: “a) we do local news, b) the issue evolved from hard science into hard politics and c) despite what you may have heard from the mainstream media, this science is far from conclusive.” Mr. Palmer said in his e-mail message to his operations manager and two women who served as a news anchor and a reporter that he placed “global warming stories in the same category as ‘the killer African bee scare’ from the 1970s or, more recently, the Y2K scare when everyone’s computer was going to self-destruct.”

But the best part of the story is NASA climate scientist Jim Hanson’s response. Dear reader, were we asked to comment on Palmer’s edict, we daresay our statement would have been, well, vivid. But Hanson, ever the dispassionate scientist, isn’t one to emote. “If you wait until Bar Harbor is underwater, it’s too late,” he told the Times.

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Comments

Michael Palmer must be linked to the White House. Only the Bushies are stupid enough to deny the catastrophy awaiting us for more profits.
We see the evidence of anthropogenic climate change all around us. All we have to do is look.
Folks, it may already be too late, but if we act now, and act with vigor, we may be able to save ourselves.
Read "The Winds of Change" by Eugene Linden, then role up your sleeves and get to work.

Really scary, and not just because it's Halloween. Makes you wonder if Palmer really believes that the evidence of global warming is inconclusive or, more likely, which of the many global-warming-is-bad-for-my-business thugs got to him. I'd recommend that Palmer also read: "The Ravaging Tide: Strange Weather, Future Katrinas, and the Coming Death of America's Coastal Cities" by Mike Tidwell, and "The Weather Makers: How Man Is Changing the Climate and What It Means for Life on Earth" by Tim Flannery.